March 12, 2004 | Spartan is a nifty, twisty thriller about the hunt for an abducted First Daughter. And one of the coolest things about the movie is, nobody ever flat-out says that the abducted young woman is the First Daughter. Come to think of it, no one even bothers to explicitly refer to her father as -– well, you know, the President of the United States.
You rarely get much in the way of exposition or extraneous detail from writer-director David Mamet, the best Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright ever to moonlight as a moviemaker. In Spartan , however, Mamet is even stingier than usual when it comes to supplying context or transition. Time and again, he simply drops you into the middle of a beautifully photographed, moodily suspenseful scene, and forces you to figure out who’s who and what’s what on your own.
But that’s not such a bad thing: If you’re intelligent and attentive, you can follow the storyline with reasonable ease, and perhaps even take pleasure in Mamet’s perverse refusal to underline and italicize every plot element. Indeed, Spartan actually makes you realize how frequently more conventional movies bend over backwards to overstate the obvious. Rest assured, no one here ever says anything like, “My God, they’ve kidnapped the President’s daughter!” Or, “The FBI, the CIA and the Secret Service are working together on this!” When it comes to parceling out key info, or explaining how his protagonist gets from Point A to Point B, Mamet prefers to show, not tell, with brutally graceful efficiency.
Which is not to say, however, that the dialogue in Spartan isn’t up to the usual standards of Mamet-speak. The argot is instantly recognizable as the playwright-filmmaker’s trademark brand: Ambiguous pronouncements, darkly comical non sequiturs, angry tirades employed as offensive weapons, innocuous phrases repeated over and over until they’re funny or scary or a little of both. (To amuse yourself, keep a running tally of just how many times various characters ask: “Where’s the girl?”) There are slightly fewer four-letter words here than one customarily encounters in a Mamet scenario. But the verbal interplay crackles with Mamet’s usual mix of sardonic wit and show-offy aggression.
I can’t tell you who’s talking, but here’s one of my favorite exchanges: “Did you burn me?” “I can’t say I did.” “Are you willing to prove it?” “Well, the Lord hates a coward.”
Here’s another: “Are you ready?” “Do you want to gossip, or do you want to shoot somebody?” Quentin Tarantino, eat your heart out.
If I appear to be avoiding any discussion of plot specifics, that’s only because I am. Spartan percolates with enough fake-outs, false clues, double whammies and triple-crosses to flummox even the cagey con artists and crafty career criminals who prowled through such earlier Mamet films as Heist, House of Games and The Spanish Prisoner. But there’s no way to provide a detailed synopsis without running the risk of spoiling the nasty surprises that Mamet wants to spring.
Here’s all you really need to know: Special Ops officer Robert Scott (a well-cast Val Kilmer) is called in when the President’s daughter is snatched from her Harvard dorm room. Maybe she was grabbed by white slavers who don’t know who she is (and likely will kill her if they discover her identity). On the other hand, maybe something else happened. Maybe Scott should trust his superiors (William H. Macy, Ed O’Neill) and suspect his new partner (Derek Luke). Or vice versa. Or maybe he should trust nobody.
In any event, Scott – – like some steadfast Spartan warrior of centuries ago –- has to perform solo while completing his mission. He vows that he will find the girl, or die trying. Maybe he’ll do both.
